Gambler's With No Chance

Gamblers believe that unbiased outcomes are less certain, or dependent, than biased
outcomes. They believe the unbiased outcomes distribute the chance of winning
among the players. However, no evidence indicates that unbiased outcomes are less
dependent, or certain, than biased outcomes. Thus, whether the outcome is biased or
unbiased, the chance of winning remains undistributed; no winner could have lost
and no loser could have won. The gambler's philosophy of distributed chances favors
the sellers of lottery tickets over the buyers by convincing buyers they have chances
they do not have.

The Promoter's Problem

Before tossing a coin, the Midway promoter offers two, half chances at a single prize.
He offers the possibility of winning to players with incompatible expectations. Yet,
observing the coin, it is not evident that it would divide and distribute the chance of
winning. On the contrary, inspection reveals that the sides are incompatible. Whatever
the conditions, any conditions making it possible for one side to fall upward make it
impossible for the other. It is analogous to a sliding window where we open one side
by closing the other. Given this, how can the promoter tell one player she can win
without telling the other he cannot? How can the promoter know who can without
knowing who cannot? The chances are not half-and-half, but one and zero. No
incompatible outcomes have the same chance of occurring. Granted that one player
can win, has the promoter grounds for telling either her or him that winning is a
possibility? Evidently, the promoter's ignorance of what will and will not occur
extends to what can and cannot occur.

Telling clients he does not know who will win causes the promoter no problem, yet he
does not relish confessing his ignorance of whether a client can or cannot win. If he
cannot assure each client of the possibility of winning, what does he sell repeatedly?

Players need not have this problem. Her realization that her winning means his losing
need not concern her and his realization that his winning means her losing need not
concern him. The promoter alone has the problem of reassuring both.

A Philosophy of Causation

Promoters have solved their problem with an ingenious and seemingly plausible
philosophy of causation. Presumably, the promoter would agree that if the outcome
were conditioned, "any conditions making it possible for one side to fall upward make
it impossible for the other." However, he conceives of the outcome as unconditioned,
as "pure" chance. When convincing his client that she could win, the promoter is not
thinking of conditions effecting (bringing about) her winning. He thinks of her as
having the freedom to win. Because the outcome is unconditioned, nothing precludes
her winning; it is not impossible.

For the gambler, the distinction between biased and unbiased coin-tosses has causal
significance. It is, for him, the distinction between those not occurring by chance and
those occurring by chance. Only when the coin is unbiased does each player have the
same chance. While biased coin tosses have a factor favoring one side, unbiased or
fair coin tosses have no factor favoring one side. For example, since merely changing
the rate of spin does not affect the outcome, the coin can fall either way with respect
to it. If the coin can fall either way with respect to each factor individually, the
gambler concludes that it can fall either way as far as their combination is concerned.
Stated otherwise, if the outcomes have an equal chance as far as the several factors,
taken individually, are concerned then he concludes that they have an equal chance as
far as the combination of factors is concerned. That is, unbiased devices close no
doors. Biased devices close doors and diminish the uncertainty by degrees. Thus in
telling two clients that either could win he means either could win as far as a biasing
factor is concerned. Making it possible for either client to win becomes a matter of
removing all the biasing factors, a matter of clearing the way by using an unbiased
device. As the promoter understands the unbiased coin, each side has an equal chance
and there is only one. Thus, he distributes the chance equally, assigning each side half
a chance. Convinced that unbiased coins divide and distribute chances, he is
comfortable reassuring both players.

Objections

If dependence were solely a matter of bias there would be nothing to exclude either
side winning. However, the outcome is conditioned and the distinction between
biased and unbiased factors, while helpful in anticipating the outcome, has no bearing
on its dependence. Although bringing about heads with a biasing factor and bringing
about heads with no biasing factor involves differing combinations of factors, the bias
is irrelevant to the certainty of the outcome. Regardless of whether some factor is
biased, the outcome still depends on a particular combination of factors. Even when
the outcome is independent of each factor individually, it depends on their
combination. Balanced coins have no more independence and distribute the chance of
winning no more generously than biased coins.

Given the initial orientation of the coin and the forces acting on it, it cannot fall other
than it does. Each toss either reverses or repeats the initial orientation. With each
head-toss either heads initially was repeated or tails initially was reversed. With each
tail-toss the paths are just the opposite. Whether the coin is biased or unbiased, no set
of conditions effecting a head-toss could effect a tail-toss. Although the outcome is
independent of the initial orientation and it is independent of whether the toss reverses
or repeats the initial orientation, it depends on their combination. In addition, when
we trace the successive angles of the tossed coin with stop-action photography the
photographs of unbiased coins hold no surprises. They show as much dependence on
their antecedent conditions as the outcomes of biased coins. The coin's balance frees
only the player's imagination.

Fairness is a matter of what the players know and does not depend on the distinction
between biased and unbiased coins. Regardless of how she came by her knowledge
and whether the coin is biased or unbiased, when she knows more about the outcome
than he does and exploits that information her play is unfair. While such exploitation
is far easier with biased than unbiased coins it would also be unfair if the coin were
unbiased and she knew more than he about the conditions effecting the outcome.
Plays with same-sided coins are fair if the caller believes it to be a standard coin. The
alternative outcomes exist only in the player's imagination. If to be fair each player
must have some chance of winning, plays with neither biased nor unbiased coins are
fair.

Biased or unbiased, if there is only one outcome there is only one chance, one
window of opportunity. Regardless of how losers lose, they had no chance of
winning. Because we cannot distinguish between the conditions for a head-toss and
the conditions for a tail-toss beforehand, there is a sense in which the unbiased coin
distributes our ignorance uniformly. However, our ignorance does not alter the
distinction; it does not replace one open door and one closed door with two half open
doors. It means that we do not know which door is open and which closed.

Other Unbiased Devices

According to the gambler's misconceived philosophy of causation the following

gambling devices, when unbiased, also distribute the chance of winning among the
players.

Having shaken an urn vigorously with balls of the same size, shape, weight and
texture, the gambler believes any ball could occupy any position. He believes he did
this by eliminated all factors favoring one ball over another. Of course, it is true that
the position of no ball depends on a difference between them. However, where each
ball rests depends on its initial position and the forces acting on it. Given those
conditions the path of each is unique and no ball could be other than where it is. The
balls are interchangeable but the combinations of factors controlling the positions of
the balls are not. No ball other than the one drawn could have been in the position to
be drawn. In terms of chances, one ball has a chance of one, the rest a chance of zero.
With an unbiased spinner, no factor differentiates between the segments. Since it has
no "rough spots", the gambler believes that the chances of winning are as evenly
distributed as the friction. The outcome is independent of changes in the coefficient of
friction, of changes in the angular velocity and of changes in the point of origin.
However, it is not independent of changes in their combination. The segments
excluded by these factors have a chance only in the gambler's imagination.

High-stake players use dice machined to close tolerances so the sides of a

homogeneous material will be equidistant from the center of mass. Machining to close
tolerances precludes a difference in the sides affecting the outcome thus causing the
gambler to imagine the die could fall in any of six ways. However, given the original
orientation and the combination of unbiased factors acting on them, even well made
dice can terminate in only one way. Well made or poorly made, unbiased or biased,
dice do not distribute the chance of winning.

Face down, the playing cards in the deck are interchangeable. Their sequence when
shuffled is due neither to physical differences between the cards nor differences
perceived by the shuffler. No card is where it is due to differences between the cards.
The absence of such differences causes the gambler to imagine that a card could be
anywhere in the deck. Yet the position of each card depends on its original position
and subsequent manipulation, with respect to which, no two cards are the same. The
path of each card during the shuffle is unique. Each card is exactly where the shuffler
placed it and the chance of it being elsewhere is zero.
Summary

No evidence indicates that unbiased outcomes give more players a chance of winning
than biased outcomes. Obviously, only the promoter profits from the belief that with
unbiased outcomes any player could win. The gamblers misconceived philosophy of
causation favors sellers of lottery tickets over buyers. Whether knowingly or with the
aid of an unbiased device, if one ticket is to be drawn from 100, 1 buyer cannot lose
and 99 cannot win.